


sweet tooth for a liar

by nea_writes



Category: D.Gray-man
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Lack of Communication, Loneliness, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-25
Updated: 2018-03-25
Packaged: 2019-04-07 20:35:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14089131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nea_writes/pseuds/nea_writes
Summary: Just say something. Open your mouth. Let the words fall out, splattering like blood, crashing like glass, tinkling like precious gems. Between you, bare them. Pick them up with your dirtied hands, present them, say: this is the truth.Do it.Allen opened his mouth. He trembled. He hesitated.





	sweet tooth for a liar

**Author's Note:**

> Today I found an old letter. It had been written to me, from a friend. I didn't even read it. I knew what it would say. Maybe not the specifics, because we had written a lot of letters, but the gist of what almost all of them had said at some point. 
> 
> So like always, here's a dgm rendition of it. It's not even the same emotion, or in the same vicinity, but it's as intense I suppose.

It was, in spite of it all, love.

 

“Hey,” Allen said, voice muffled into Link’s stomach. There was a sharp chill in the air, clinging even through their sweaters and covers, and not even the heat coalesced into their shared apartment could chase it away. Arms wrapped around Link’s middle in some desperate attempt to make him stay, Allen could still feel the cold. It was the emptiness, the certainty that what had once been there, was now gone. Sucked away.

Allen remembered learning, back when he’d attended school with any kind of regularity, that cold was not the introduction, but rather the absence. It was simply warmth, gone. Back then he’d understood with precise clarity about molecules and heat and rushing into the absence but being spaced too thin, becoming useless. Now, he remembered it with a fanatical desperation, a dogged fear of a understanding too empathetic, too deep, too entrenched to ever change.

Above him, Link hummed. His finger made muted swipes along his tablet screen. Allen didn’t know what he was reading. Maybe he wasn’t reading at all. Maybe he was looking at his calendar, or checking his email, or browsing an article. It didn’t matter. Allen didn’t know. 

Allen turned his face towards Link’s stomach, breath now muffled but unwilling to move away. “What are you doing?”

“Reading,” Link said simply. An answer. It could very well be true. It could be a lie. Allen didn’t know. It was simple to find out, really. Just wiggle his way up Link, peer down at the screen, verify the truth himself. He didn’t. Instead, he squeezed Link tighter, and when Link glanced at him, Allen mumbled something about the cold.

“I’ll turn the heater up,” Link said in reply, followed by more muted swipes as Link surely pulled up the app connected to their smart thermostat. Minutes later Allen could hear the machine crank, the heat wheeze its way through the vents, and then soon enough it tickled at the back of his neck and on his palms as the temperature in the room surely rose. 

Allen was still cold.

 

He didn’t know when it had started. One day, Link said something, and Allen had questioned him. Not with any real intent, or doubt, but the question had niggled at the back of Allen’s mind and he spoke it without thinking. Faintly surprised, Link had answered him anyways. Allen couldn’t even remember what the question was. 

He only had himself to blame for that, what with the way he buried everything he could. He could almost see it. It was always in warm soil, lining under his nails, digging and digging and digging, and when he was surrounded by piles of crumbling dirt, he would gently lay it down. Remorselessly, he’d grasp handfuls of dirt and shove it over, and he could nearly feel it. The suffocation. The loss of light. A dirty secret being buried.

And he’d wash his hands and later he’d still feel it. Dirt lining his nails, no matter how often he dug it out. Link once commented he should clip them short if they bothered him so much, and Allen had smiled.

 

Link came home and Allen was sitting on the couch.

He had his knees up to his chest, arms loosely wrapped around them, and he was tucked into the side, eyes locked on the screen. At Link’s entrance, Allen glanced up with an empty kind of smile, clearly distracted, it said, and he turned back to the screen. He wasn’t actually watching it.

Link’s lips twitched with his own answering smile, and Allen ached. It nearly shocked him, and he gripped at the soft flesh of his own arm where Link couldn’t see. His throat was closed tight and his heart was beating fast enough to be painful, and he couldn’t even see past the haze that flooded his head. Unbidden, he unfolded and stood off the couch. He crossed the space between Link and he, and with Link’s back to him, Allen embraced him. He could feel Link’s stomach flex under his arms, his shoulder blades moving where Allen’s face was pressed between them, and it wasn’t that Allen was so short but that he was bowed, face tucked in, as close to Link as he could get. 

Link’s laughter rumbled in his chest, felt where it couldn’t be heard. “What is it?” He asked, almost teasingly. 

Allen ached and he hugged Link tighter, but he only laughed back and said, painfully honest, “I missed you, that’s all.”

Link twisted and pressed a dry kiss to Allen’s temple.

 

Beside him, Link was asleep.

Allen watched him, wide awake even though it was closer to morning than night. When Link slept, his bangs fell askew across his face. It was boyishly sweet, hopelessly endearing. Sometimes they hid the beauty marks scattered across Link’s face, birthmarks that had always bothered Link because of how human they made him. Allen loved them, and at one point he’d kissed every single one, again and again, mindless adoration.

He wanted to, but he couldn’t. Link hadn’t said anything, in fact he loved it when Allen did, but there were manacles clamped tight around Allen’s spine now, and they tethered him to the other side of the bed.

He’d lay awake all night, aching to move closer. To huddle in Link’s arms, to kiss his closed eyelids, the tip of his nose, his lips, to brush his hair from his face. He’d lay, arms folded under his head, knees drawn to his chest, he’d lay awake all night, and he wouldn’t move. 

He couldn’t.

 

It was frustratingly simple. Just do it. Reach across, grasp his hand, hold it tight. Say,  _ I love you. I miss you.  _

He’d stare at his knees, and he couldn’t. Why? What was holding him back?

He could feel the dirt lining his nails.

 

It was early morning. 

Before, Allen would sometimes wake up first. It depended, really, on his quality of his sleep, of his dreams, sometimes he’d just wake up with nothing to blame for it. Link always woke up at the same time, six on the dot. Then, it didn’t matter who woke up first. They’d always smiled, eyes opening to see each other. Mindless doting and touching, as if awed. Making breakfast together, feeding each other, sweet kisses, lingering gazes, hugs that lasted too long, always being late.

Now, it didn’t matter who woke up first. Allen always stayed in bed longer. Link, who tended to sleep on his side, opened his eyes just as often facing Allen as he wasn’t. He’d roll out of bed, and get ready. He’d make coffee. He’d eat a perfunctory breakfast. He’d leave. 

Allen would shift, until he lay where Link had, and stay a little longer.

 

Just say something. Open your mouth. Let the words fall out, splattering like blood, crashing like glass, tinkling like precious gems. Between you, bare them. Pick them up with your dirtied hands, present them, say: this is the truth. 

Do it.

Allen opened his mouth. He trembled. He hesitated. Tears stung his eyes and he closed his mouth, hunched over, balled his fists over his eyes, and cried.

 

One day, Link came home, and they said nothing to each other. Allen didn’t know when this had started. But it was there, between them, heavy and aching and empty and so cold. 

 

Do something. Say something.

 

Allen was sitting at their table, hands around Link’s favorite cup, and he was staring into the depths of the warm drink when he finally realized that if he did nothing at all, then nothing would happen. Nothing would change. This would continue, and Allen would stay the same, perfunctorily happy, perfectly pleased, smile warm as the sun, hands still soiled. 

Link came home and found Allen waiting for him.

Change, even from the worst, was always frightening. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I always choose to work out things through Allen, though I feel a little bad for it.
> 
> Link didn't mean to do it, and neither did Allen, it just happened. But they'll talk, and they'll be fine, and everything will be okay. They won't go back to what they had, they'll move on to something better. 
> 
> I hope that's the end of this recent burn-out and writer's block.


End file.
